


The Peaceful Tree

by ruby_shooting_stars



Series: Ten Short Stories [5]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Growing Up, Light Angst, Sneaking Out, Trees, rediscovering freedom
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-03
Updated: 2018-01-03
Packaged: 2019-02-27 14:43:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,338
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13250394
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ruby_shooting_stars/pseuds/ruby_shooting_stars
Summary: Near my old elementary school, there were a few trees my friend and I like to climb.And one was the peaceful tree.





	The Peaceful Tree

**Author's Note:**

> This is actually a slightly embellished story from my own life. It's a bit personal in nature, but I kinda like how it turned out.

Near my elementary school, there’s a small patch of six trees next to a miniscule playground. To be brutally honest, this was very little in the way of entertainment, but for six year old eyes, this was heaven. My friend Julia and I specifically loved the trees. It started out with us swinging on the two swings, sticking out our tongues at the kids who didn’t get a turn, laughing as we would go higher and higher, souls free and happy and _free_. But the parents would get mad that their dear little children aren’t getting any swing time, and with no parents with us to back us up, we had to change our plans a bit. We went to the trees.

Now, climbing trees was a frowned upon activity before we started doing it. The trees were sappy, pretty hard to climb, and were slightly hidden from the parents, who usually sat on a small bench, watching their children squeal and shout while talking about some neighborhood gossip. Or maybe they talked about Julia and me always coming to the playground like it was our turf. Who knows? We didn’t care that much, and we were honestly really happy to be away from the parents once we realized the trees were a sanctuary for us.

No kids went there but us. The first time we stepped into the land of the gentle giants, we had no idea if we could climb them or not. One of the trees had such high branches, we couldn’t get close by jumping. Another had a branch so big it made the tree look like an elephant. Another curved strangely at the top.

And at the end of the patch, the farthest away from the playground, was the tree that was to be known as the Peaceful Tree.

Ah, the Peaceful Tree. All of the trees we eventually named and grew to love and knew extremely well, the Peaceful Tree was truly our home within the small patch. The branches were low and easy to climb, and it always left less sap on our hands than the other trees would. There were many places to sit, and even places to lay down, do homework, jump, exercise, pretend to be spiders, etc. It was our home after school for an hour, and we forgot everything about home and parents and school and homework and books and popular kids; it just wasn’t important.

Secrets were shared there, food was shared there, tears about stuffed animals were shared there, and maybe some deeper topics as well. It was ours for the taking. We were the queens. We were unstoppable.

Of course, the kids slowly accepted that the trees were actually a good idea. The came over to the trees once in a while, and started climbing around, pretending they were better than us when they clearly weren’t. They would come and go in waves, but Julia and I always stayed. We would run to the Peaceful Tree, throwing our book-heavy backpacks on the ground, and start our daily adventure.

But it couldn’t last forever.

In fourth grade, Julia and I split up. I went to different school at my parent’s urging, and Julia simply moved and had to go to another school. Her parents and mine knew that we were close friends, though they never accompanied us to the trees, and her parents sometimes drove Julia over to the playground near her old elementary school (I was walking distance away).

We kept our appointments at first. We would chat through our parents’ emails, making plans for adventures in the trees.

Julia was the first to break her promise. She apologized endlessly, and I was fine with it, though my fourth grade heart couldn’t understand the pain and trepidation I felt in my heart. I just went along with it.

Then I broke my promise. I apologized endlessly, and she was fine with it. And it happened again. And again.

Again.

We didn’t talk as much. By the end of fourth grade, we sent one email each in two months. We had lost touch.

Fifth grade passed. I gained some true friends that year, rediscovered the joy of reading and learning. I’d glance at the trees once in a while as I passed by, but make an excuse and go home.

I took another friend there, tried to get another monkey partner that didn’t live in a different neighborhood. Then, I found out that the Peaceful Tree was getting quite old, and that the lack of sap was a curse in disguise.

A branch broke right under my friend.

She never went again.

More branches broke, and by seventh grade, nearly all the bottom branches were broken off, either by ill meaning kids or by happy, energetic kids who grew a little too much for the old tree. It was hard to climb now, and it added to my excuses not to climb, not to try and rediscover my sense of freedom. And I didn’t have any of the friends that I gained in fifth grade anymore. We had lost touch. No way would they come to a random playground far away because of some weird kid they talked to a lot in elementary school.

Not that I even looked at the playground anymore. I would walk past, hard eyes pressed to the sidewalk, ignoring the squeals of the new generation of elementary school children.

I forgot what it was like to be free, to be happy, to not be bound by the numerous things I had to do, what it was like to even have an hour for myself.

That was partly my fault. Terrible time management gave me the illusion of no time, and more than usual homework pressed down on me that I had no time, missing assignments screamed at me that I didn’t have enough time. Time was all I was thinking about.

I was breaking down, that eighth grade year.

I never had a lot of friends, and losing that precious time to interact with people took a blow on me. I handled it fine at first, but it piled on and on and on until I felt so _lonely_ I wanted to scream.

I was crying when I sneaked out.

I came out through the first floor window so I wouldn’t sound the beep as I left the house. I left the window slightly open and padded through the spring night.

The neighborhood I lived in was relatively peaceful, and even if it wasn’t, I had no sense of danger that night. I no longer cared, that night.

My legs took me on my most familiar route: right to my old elementary school, where my bus stop was. But before I walked up the hill all the way up to the school, I stopped, and looked at the empty playground again.

The swings creaked as they swung from the wind, but everything else was nearly perfectly still. There weren’t any of the customary children, none of the birds that would sometimes sing, just darkness and stillness.

In a daze, I walked past the playground and to the trees.

Normally, I would’ve turned on the flashlight on my phone, but my instincts and memories made it easy to go straight to the Peaceful Tree.

I look up at it for a second.

Then began to climb.

I didn’t climb very high, just to my favorite spot. I chose it so long ago because I knew I would never grow out of it, and I was proven right. I fit the same way I had fit in third grade. I closed my eyes, letting tears of who-knows-what emotion leak out of them.

I sat there for an hour or so, letting my mind race however it wanted, let it explore the pathways of long forgotten memories in my brain. I don’t remember now exactly what I thought about that night, but I remember thinking one thing:

 _I’m gonna talk to Julia tomorrow_.

**Author's Note:**

> Criticism is highly appreciated!!!


End file.
